


The Traveling Man

by kirani



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Dex's Mom is amazing, First Kiss, Getting Together, Injury, M/M, Magic, Magical Realism, Pining, nothing terrible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 15:23:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16956525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirani/pseuds/kirani
Summary: It takes Will a long time to realize it’s happening.Like, really happening.The first time, he just brushes it off as adrenaline. He doesn’t think he was close enough to reach Nurse before he fell, slipping on an early patch of ice in mid-December of their freshman year at Samwell, but he must have been. He moved fast. His instincts are in tune to his D-man and best friend.That’s all.---In which Dex inherits a magical talent on his eighteenth birthday that seems determined to protect Nursey.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ithinkiloveyoubetternow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ithinkiloveyoubetternow/gifts).



> I hope you like it, giftee! you mentioned fairytales and fantasy but this idea came to me and wouldn't leave me be, so you get some magical realism.  
> A very special thank you to my beta and cheerleader, Sav

It takes Will a long time to realize it’s happening. 

Like, really happening.

The first time, he just brushes it off as adrenaline. He doesn’t think he was close enough to reach Nurse before he fell, slipping on an early patch of ice in mid-December of their freshman year at Samwell, but he must have been. He moved fast. His instincts are in tune to his D-man and best friend.

That’s all. 

The second time, it’s a little harder to brush off. He’s walking with Chowder and Nursey in January, Chow in the middle, when Nurse steps out into traffic. 

The light had changed but a blue Toyota was running the red. Will saw it and then he saw the back of Nurse’s head as he wrapped his arms around his waist and yanked him back onto the curb. 

“Nice reflexes, Dexy,” Nurse says, slipping his chill mask back on after only a second of gaping. “Didn’t see that guy.”

“Just, watch out, Nurse.”

Chowder looks at him, eyebrows furrowed. “How’d you move that fast?”

Will just shrugs.

Logically, he should have had to push past Chowder to get to Nurse. But he hadn’t. He’d seen the car and then... he’d had ahold of Nursey. He shook it off and continued walking to practice. 

By the third time it happens, Will is certain something strange is happening. 

It’s nearly March and Nursey is chirping Will, who’s at least ten feet behind him, half the team between them, and not watching where he’s going. He swings his head back to the front in time to get a face full of a door jam. 

Except he doesn’t. 

Because Will is there. He jerks Nurse by the arm away from the door jam so that he only butts it with his shoulder instead of his face. 

“Aw, I knew you cared, Dexadoo,” Nursey croons. 

“Watch where you’re going, Nurse,” Will shoots back with a scowl, his mind racing. He had moved past at least half a dozen teammates in a narrow hallway and hadn’t brushed against a single one of them. 

He should have had to push through the whole crowd. He shouldn’t have made it to Nursey’s side in time. But he had. 

He doesn’t know what’s happening, but since Nursey seems dedicated to doing himself personal harm and Will seems destined to be the one to stop it, he decides to stick close. He’ll just have to do catch Nurse himself himself before the weird magic thing does.

It works fairly well in day to day life. He sticks close to Nursey at meals and walking on campus and at the Haus. 

The place it doesn’t work is on the ice. 

So far, he’s never  _ traveled _ , as he’s decided to call it, on the ice, even when Nursey is taking a hit, knowing that the helmet and pads will keep him safe. He’s an NCAA Division I athlete. He knows how to take a check.

But then…

It’s the middle of a playoffs game and everyone is running on fumes. 

The crosscheck is dirty. Will can see that from across the ice. But what triggers it is that when Derek goes flying his helmet comes loose. 

It happens in an instant, like before. He starts to skate towards his defense partner and suddenly he’s already there, on his knees, skates tucked safely behind him and Nursey’s weight collapsing onto his chest. His head bounces harmlessly off of Will’s pads and Nursey looks up at him. 

“Did I hit my head? Did I pass out?”

Will is vaguely aware of a whistle blowing and play stopping as he shakes his head. 

“No, you didn’t. You’re alright.”

“How’d you get here so fast?” Nursey still seems dazed, his mind trying to fill in the gaps left by Will’s travel. 

“Doubting my speed on the ice, Nurse?” Will chirps, trying to smirk and feeling it fall short.

Nursey just frowns. 

“Come on,” Will says. “Up you get.”

The referee comes over and confirms that he is alright and then they start the clock again on the power play. 

Later, Will watches the tape over and over again, trying to see where he moved but he was just...  in one place and then in another. 

It could be a glitch in the tape. But Will knows it isn’t. 

It’s really happening. He’s… teleporting? Apparating? He’s traveling across space without time passing. 

He’s freaking the fuck out, that’s what he’s doing. 

He spends too long staring at the wall of his dorm, trying to understand what could be causing it. Why it hasn’t happened before. What he’s supposed to  _ do _ about it. His roommate coming in jolts him away from his thoughts.

He’ll just have to be super vigilant about being near Derek. Forever. 

Chill.


	2. Chapter 2

It doesn’t happen again during the school year, Will keeps close to Nursey whenever he can, and soon he’s made it to summer break. 

He’s back in Maine, working on his Uncle’s lobster boat again, and he’s at home, exhausted, when Derek texts him.

_ Skype? _

Despite his exhaustion and his early alarm set for the next morning, he smiles at his phone. 

_ Sure. _

He boots up his laptop and settles onto his bed, propped up against a pillow. After a moment, Skype rings. 

“Dexy!” 

“Hey, Nurse.”

“Miss me?”

“Sure.” Will gives him a small smile. 

Derek grins at him. 

“What are you up to?” he asks, and Nursey launches into a spiel about his parents hosting some stodgy white guy for dinner and being bored to literal tears. 

“ _ Literal _ tears, Derek? Thought you were an English major.” 

“Shut up,  _ William _ ,” Nursey grins back. 

He doesn't realize he’d used Nursey’s first name until he’d thrown “William” back at him. And, well, he did think of him as Derek most of the time now, didn’t he? 

What the fuck.

“We should give each other room tours!” Derek says out of nowhere. 

“Um, okay?” Will says. He turns the laptop sideways on his lap so it shows the rest of the room. “This is it.”

“Aw, come on, do the whole thing!” Nursey whines. 

Will sighs but stands, holding his laptop backward against his chest, and slowly turns around in the center of the room. 

“There’s my bed, I was there until this asshole made me stand up and give a tour of this boring ass room.” He turns to the next wall. “My desk. Mostly a bunch of Samwell shit I haven’t touched since I got home.” Another turn. “Closet. Spent a lot of time in there,” he chuckles. “And the door to the hallway.”

He flips the laptop back around and flops onto the bed. 

“That’s pretty much it.”

“You hang out in your closet?” Derek quirks an eyebrow. 

Oh. Shit. He’d gotten so used to being home and out again, joking with his brother and not caring how things came out. 

He could play it off as sarcasm. Nursey would believe that. 

Or he could just go with it. 

“Well,” he swallows. “The closet. In general. Yeah.”

“Are you seriously coming out to me with a closet joke, Poindexter?”

“So what if I am?”

Nursey grins broadly at him from the screen and Will breathes out a small sigh. 

“Thank you for trusting me with this moment,” Derek says, fake seriously.

“Oh fuck off,” Will huffs, but he’s still smiling. “You gonna give me a tour, too, or did I get off my ass for nothing?”

Derek jumps up, jostling the laptop and making Will dizzy for a moment as he swings it around to show his bedroom. 

“So, that’s my bed,” Nursey starts when the camera stabilizes. It looks like a queen bed with a big fluffy duvet rumpled over the top. Because of course Nurse has a massive bed. “It’s pretty comf.”

Will rolls his eyes at the abbreviated word, even though Nursey can’t see him. 

The camera swings wildly again. “Over here is my desk and like trophies and stuff.” Will briefly gets a view of shelves above a large desk covered in trophies and ribbons before Derek swings it again. 

“Here’s my closet, but you already took the closet joke, so moving on. Dresser,” he says, swinging the laptop again before it jolts and he says “oh shit!” and the view plummets.

And then Will is in Derek’s bedroom in New York, wrapping his arms around him and hauling him back to his feet, head inches away from the corner of his dresser. 

“Fuck,” Will says. 

The color drains from Nursey’s face, leaving him oddly pale. Will is certain if he wasn’t holding him up he would have fallen to the floor. 

“Dex?” Nursey stammers out. “What’s happening?”

“Um, I can explain. Kind of.”

Nursey just stares at him. 

“Let’s sit down.” Will takes the laptop from Derek’s hands and gently sets it on the bed beside where Nursey has collapsed onto the mattress. 

Will sits down gingerly on the other side of Nursey, who is staring at him with wide eyes. 

“So, sometimes I kinda teleport.”

“What the actual fuck, Poindexter.”

“I don’t know how else to describe it! I’ve never actually done it this far before. No one’s ever actually… seen it. It didn’t start until Samwell. I haven’t really figured out how it works.”

Nursey continues to stare at him and Will drops his gaze down to his hands in his lap. 

“That’s all I’ve got.”

“What the fuck,” Derek says again. 

“You said that already,” Will chirps, but it falls flat. 

“Well excuse me for needing a moment to process,” Derek shoots back. “You just… teleport. For no reason?”

“Well, I teleport to stop…” he pauses, considering. “People from getting hurt.” Derek doesn’t need to know it’s only ever happened for him. 

Nursey stares at him a moment longer, then huffs out a laugh. “You would have protective magic, Poindexter.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re literally a defenseman. And remember that time you drove us to Boston and your hand flew out to hold me back even though there was a seatbelt and an airbag?” 

“What about it?”

Derek raises an eyebrow at him. “It fits.”

Will feels himself blush. He shrugs. 

“So… what now?” Nursey says finally. 

“Oh, well, I’ve never traveled so far I needed to get back. So. I don’t know.”

Nursey laughs. 

Will studies his hands again.

But then his mother’s voice comes out of Nursey’s laptop. They haven’t hung up the Skype call. What is he going to tell her? 

“Will?” Her voice is tinny and distant and he watches on the screen as she comes into his bedroom after knocking and looking at the screen of the laptop, left right where he left it on the bed. 

“Will?” She asks again, peering into the camera. “Where are you?”

Will swallows hard. Nursey looks at him, eyes wide again. 

“New York?” He offers. 

He expects her to ask how or literally anything besides what she does. Which is sigh heavily.

“Come on back, then.”

“What?”

“Come back. It’s dinner time.”

“I- I don’t know how, Ma,” Will stammers. 

She blinks for a moment before nodding. 

“I’ll do it, then. Say goodbye to your friend.” He’s pretty sure she winks when she says “friend” but it’s hard to see on the screen. 

“What?” He croaks. He looks at Nurse but he looks just as confused as he is. “Bye?” He says. 

Nursey nods, eyes still wide, and then Will is back in his own bedroom, his mother catching him as he stumbles forward. He looks at the laptop again, Derek staring into the camera after him. 

“Goodbye, Derek,” his mother says, ending the call. She straightens and looks at Will.

“You didn’t tell me you were in love!”


	3. Chapter 3

“What?!” Will exclaims as his mom wraps him in a tight hug.

“I’m sorry I put it off for so long but you were already off at school at eighteen and then you hadn’t mentioned anyone so I thought it was okay but oh, I’m so happy for you!”

“Mom, what is going on?” Will pushes back from her embrace in wild panic. 

She studies him. 

“I should start at the beginning I suppose. Do it properly.”

“That would be great,” Will says sarcastically.

“Watch your tone, young man.”

Will flushes, but she just sits down on the edge of his bed and pats the space next to her. 

“I ought to have done this right when you turned eighteen but I suppose it just got away from me. Oh well. What have you figured out?”

Will gapes at her for a moment before he finds words.

“I travel sometimes. To stop things. People getting hurt. I think that was the fifth time. But usually much shorter distances. It did happen on the ice once though.”

“People?”

“Derek,” Will blushes bright red.

His mom just nods. “That’s what I thought. How long have you two been together?”

“We’re not together!” 

She frowns. “Why not?”

“Why -- we’re just friends, mom.”

She blinks at him, then nods. “Okay. That’s okay. Well. In our family, when you turn eighteen, there’s a bit of an inheritance. A magical one. You’ve gathered that.”

Will nods, mouth dry. 

“It typically activates when a loved one is in danger. Did something happen with Derek, just then?”

“He, um, I think he tripped? But he was gonna hit his head on the corner of the dresser. He’s weirdly good at hitting his head. Except,” he swallows. “Except I’ve been preventing it.”

She nods. 

“With practice, you’ll be able to control it. Move him away from danger instead of yourself to him. And eventually without any danger present, like I did just now. It applies to children as well as romantic partners.”

“Nursey and I aren’t in love, Ma.”

“You said you weren’t together. That’s not the same as saying you don’t love him.”

Will thinks about Nursey. Derek. About the swoop in his stomach when he sees him in danger. The pure panic that fuels the travel. He shakes his head. 

“Just think on it, alright?” She pats his knee and stands. “Come down and set the table for me?”

Will nods and stands as if on autopilot. 

That night, he lays in bed for a long time, thinking about Nursey as a loved one. 

About loving Derek. 

It wasn’t completely out of the question if he thought about it. Derek was attractive, no one could miss that. And he did care for him. Sure, they’d had a rough start but once he’d stopped trying to equate Nursey’s class privilege with his own white privilege and actually listened to Nursey’s side of things they’d become fast friends. Their fights turned into debates which turned into conversations. They’d both learned a lot. And they were practically inseparable now. 

But love?

It would explain a lot. His complete lack of desire to date (he’d attributed it to lack of time) or even hook up (that just wasn’t for him). His decision to stick close to Nursey instead of distancing himself when this strange magic had taken hold. The fear when Nursey was about to be hurt. How he had cataloged Nursey’s smiles, his “chill” masks, his bedhead at various stress levels. 

Shit.

He might be in love with Nursey.

It takes him a long time to fall asleep and he knows he’ll feel it in the morning. 

When he gets home from the boat the next night, his mom pulls him into helping with dinner with his brother. 

“Heard you got  _ the talk _ ,” Brendan says. 

Will punches him in the arm as he walks past to the cutting board.

“Boys!”

“Sorry, Ma,” they recite in unison.

Will flicks a bit of carrot at Brendan when she isn’t looking though. 

“After dinner, we’ll start talking about training, Will,” she says from the stove. 

Brendan looks between them, brow furrowed. “Training?”

“He needs to learn to control it, especially on the ice.”

“Wait, you already met someone and didn’t tell me?” Brendan exclaims, abandoning his task to corner Will. 

He rolls his eyes. “We’re not together, I don’t know why it’s… doing the thing.”

“Bullshit, Will.”

“Language, Brendan,” their mom says wearily. 

“Who is it?”

Will blushes. “Nurse.”

Brendan whistles. “He’s a looker, I’ll give you that.”

Will glares at him. “Don’t you have vegetables to chop?”

He grins wolfishly at Will but returns to his cutting board. 

The lessons are mainly meditation at first. His mom sits next to him, each on a floor cushion, and instructs him to close his eyes and feel inside himself for the well of magic. 

He pushes away the feelings of incredulity and tries to feel for it. But he’s never felt the magic itself, just suddenly been in another location. 

“Try thinking about Derek,” she adds.

Will frowns but doesn’t open his eyes. He pictures Nursey, a goofy grin on his face and early morning bedhead at an early practice. He feels a swell of something in his chest but he’s not sure it’s magic. 

“Do you have it?”

“I think so,” Will answers. 

“Now move yourself towards him. Just forward a few feet. Where he is in your mind’s eye.”

Will furrows his brow further, pushing himself into the space in front of him, trying to touch the imaginary Derek. 

He doesn’t move. 

He sighs heavily. 

“You said he’s clumsy, yes?” She prompts.

Will nods without opening his eyes.

“Imagine him falling then. Imagine yourself catching him in the space just in front of you.”

He nods again and pulls up his image of Derek in front of him and reaching for the swell of magical affection in his chest. When he’s fairly certain he has it, he envisions Derek tripping and falling towards the coffee table and  _ pushes _ .

His butt hits the carpet as his arms grasp at thin air. His eyes fly open.

“I did it!”

“Good job, honey,” his mom smiles at him. 

Each night, they practice him calling on the magic on purpose until all he has to picture is a smile and he’s transporting himself across the room. His mom declares him ready for the next step in late July.

“You’ll have to practice moving him instead of yourself in person, but we can practice stopping anything from happening now that you have a better grasp on the magic.”

Again, she instructs him to call up his magic and add back watching an imaginary Nursey falling and then instead of pushing himself across the space, she tells him to dissipate the magic. 

The first time, he ends up sprawled on his back several feet behind his cushion, the magic pushing back at him and knocking him over. 

“Good!” His mom says. 

He opens his eyes, squinting at her through the headache that’s cropped up suddenly.

“Didn’t feel good.”

“You didn’t move. It was good.”

“I fell backward.”

“But you fell over naturally, not magically. It was more of a recoil. It means you wouldn’t accidentally show your magic.”

“I guess.”

“You’ll get the hang of it,” she promises. 

By the time it’s time to drive back down to Samwell, Will more or less has the hang of resisting a flare of magic, though it often still knocks him flat on his ass. Better than transporting him across the ice in the middle of a game, though. 

He is trying hard not to think about his training leaving Derek susceptible to injury. He can take care of himself. 

Will is trying very hard to believe that.


	4. Chapter 4

Returning to Samwell is nerve-wracking. 

He’s texted with Derek since the Skype incident, had explained the bare minimum and conveniently left out any mention of the L word.

He wonders how they will interact now. 

He wonders if Derek is afraid of him. 

He wonders if Derek loves him back.

He moves into the sophomore dorms and meets up with Nursey to walk over to the Haus and see Chowder’s new room. 

“How’d the magic lessons go, anyway? You never said,” Derek asks as they walk. 

Will’s heart skips a beat. 

“Um, pretty well,” he says, not looking at Nursey. “I can call it up on command now, more or less, and I’m working on resisting it, too. Don’t want it happening on the ice again.”

“Again?” Derek stops walking, staring at Will.

Will bites his lip. “The playoff game? Where your helmet came off?”

“I knew something weird happened! I was so sure I had hit my head and passed out for just a couple seconds or something, but they didn’t even check me for a concussion.”

“Yeah, because I caught you.”

“How did no one notice that?” 

“I have no idea,” Will sighs. “I just counted myself lucky and hoped it wouldn’t happen again.”

Derek starts walking again and Will matches his step. 

“I usually fall over when I try to resist it but it’s hard to practice without the panic of the moment, you know?”

Nursey nods, even though there’s no way he can know. 

“Oh, I did have a question though.”

“Shoot.”

“My mom says I can practice moving the person in danger instead of myself, but I’d have to practice with you.”

“Why with me?” Nursey asks, cocking an eyebrow.

Shit. “Um, I just thought we could, since you know, obviously.”

“You couldn’t practice with your mom?” 

Double shit.

“I wasn’t ready yet,” Will lies. Thankfully Nursey buys it. 

“Chill. Yeah, we can practice that when you’re ready.”

“Thanks, Nurse.”

Chowder’s room at the Haus is decorated entirely in Sharks merchandise, just like his freshman dorm had been, and they exchange summer stories as though they hadn’t all texted all summer.

It’s nice that nothing has really changed.

That weekend, Dex texts Nursey to arrange to practice redirecting the magic. 

He comes over Monday after classes when Will’s roommate is out at a study group.

“So, how does this work?” Nursey asks, throwing himself into Will’s desk chair.

“It’s kind of like meditation? You should probably sit on Brian’s bed.”

“Chill,” Derek says, moving himself to his roommate’s bed. 

Once they are both settled in comfortably, Will takes a deep breath and closes his eyes.

“Should I just sit here?” Derek asks.

“Yeah just sit and be quiet.”

“Chill,” Nursey says again, but he does fall silent. 

Will reaches into his chest for the well of magic, easy to find with Derek right across the room. 

“I’m going to draw on the magic and then move you to the side. You should scoot on the bed if I do it right. A couple feet,” Will explains, eyes still closed. He hears Nursey rustle a bit on the bed and dips into the magic.

He imagines something falling towards Nursey, then imagines him at the foot of the bed instead of the middle. Just enough to be out of harm's way. Then he  _ pushes _ .

“Shit!” Derek exclaims and Will’s eyes fly open. Derek is falling from midair down towards the bed. He bounces harmlessly. 

“Sorry,” Will blushes. “I think I imagined you too high.”

“You definitely moved me,” Derek chuckles. “Wanna try it again? Less dropping?”

“Yeah, alright.”

Derek readjusts himself back to the center of the bed and Will closes his eyes again. 

He envisions a more lateral shove this time, imagines himself pushing Nursey to the side as though he was physically next to him, instead of thinking of moving Derek with the magic. 

“Chill,” says Derek, and Will opens his eyes. Derek is sitting three feet to the left of where he started, though the blanket beneath him is unrumpled. 

“It worked!” Will smiles. 

“I felt it, I think. The magic. It pushed me and I just slid over here.”

“That’s what I was trying to do.”

“Wanna try again?”

Will nods. “I’m gonna try to look at you this time.”

Derek nods and gives him a small smile. 

Will looks into Derek’s eyes and  _ pushes _ , and Derek slides frictionless across Brian’s bed back to where he had been before. 

“Wow, that looks weird.”

Nursey laughs. “Do you understand why I was so disoriented when you did it on the ice, now?”

“Yeah, do me a favor and never scare me like that again, okay?”

“Alright,” Derek laughs a bit again. He doesn’t take it seriously but that’s not exactly his fault. 

He doesn’t know Will loves him. He doesn’t know how much it scares him to watch Derek get hurt. 

“When else have you used your magic?” Derek asks. “Besides at that Playoffs game?”

“Um, just a couple of times.”

“On who?”

“Just on your clumsy ass,” Will chirps, though he feels his cheeks blush. 

“But it would work on, like, Chowder? Or Bitty?”

Will shrugs. 

He could just tell him, but he doesn’t even know how to start that conversation. Doesn’t want to get rejected. So he says nothing. 

Derek watches him for a moment. 

“One more time?” Will asks.

“‘Kay,” Derek agrees. 

Will closes his eyes, draws back on the pool of magic, then opens his eyes and shoves Nursey back to the end of the bed. 

“Nice, Poindexter.”

“Fuck, I’m tired now.”

“You want me to get out of your hair so you can nap?”

“Nah, you can stay. I’ve got too much to do to nap.”

“Annie’s, then? We can get you some coffee to keep you awake.”

Will considers. He could use the caffeine and he probably has a few dollars in his wallet he could spare.

“I know that face, Dexy. Come on, my treat. Stop doing budgets in your head.”

Will huffs a sigh but agrees. 


	5. Chapter 5

He practices the relocating magic with Derek a few more times. 

They practice rotating him so he lands on his butt instead of his head, in case of another on-ice accident. They practice pulling him back from dangers like traffic. And away from other things in all directions and from various distances. 

Soon, he’s confident he could call on the proper force if he needs it. 

Not that he needs it. His habit formed last year of sticking close to Derek is still strong and Nursey certainly doesn’t seem to mind.

Over the course of the semester, he catches Derek as he trips three times, stears him around two mud slicks, and pulls him out of the way of falling debris once.

He only has to use the redirecting magic once, in October. He’s across the quad from Derek and sees a lacrosse ball move on a collision course with Nursey’s face. He feels the magic flex in his chest and  _ pushes _ Derek backward several feet so the ball shoots in front of him harmlessly, his eyes wide. 

The lax bros race past to retrieve their ball and Derek flicks them off before continuing over to Will. 

“Well done,” he whispers when they meet. 

Will blushes but throws an arm around Derek’s shoulders and directs them towards the dining hall as though he hadn’t just done magic on the quad. 

It’s not until spring semester that the shit hits the fan. 

It’s late January when it happens. Will is seated on the nasty green couch when Bitty calls from the kitchen that there’s fresh pie. There’s a clamber from upstairs and Chowder’s and Nursey’s voices can be heard wrestling to be the first out the door of C’s room. 

There’s a thundering down the stairs and Will looks up in time to see Derek go flying off the fourth step from the bottom.

He feels his magic swell up in his chest and he looks frantically for a way to prevent Derek from coming to harm that Chowder won’t see and finds none. 

Instead, he pushes back on the magic, keeping himself from moving or moving Derek, his heart hammering in his chest. 

He feels the magic recoil and it shoves him back into the couch cushions, knocking the air from his lungs. 

Derek’s cry of pain echoes around his ribcage. 

He springs up from the couch and rushes across to where Derek has fallen in a heap. 

Chowder joins him but Will doesn’t hear him. 

“Derek?” 

He helps Nursey to sit up and he winces with pain, grabbing at his ankle. 

“I’m sorry,” Will whispers, gripping Derek’s hand. “I’m so sorry, Derek.”

“What are you talking about, Dex?” Chowder asks from above him. “It’s not your fault.”

“Will, I’m fine. Really,” Derek says finally. “It’s just a sprain, I think.”

“Are you sure?”

Derek nods through a grimace of pain. 

“Should we take him to the student health center?” Chowder interrupts. Will finally looks up at him, then looks back to Nursey. 

Nursey nods again.

“Okay, we’ll help you up.”

Chowder and Will each take an arm and hoist Derek to his feet. He winces as weight hits his ankle and he shifts quickly to his right foot entirely. Derek loops an arm over Will’s shoulder and he sees him do the same around Chowder and the three of them hobble out of the Haus.

It’s just a twist. 

They put him in a brace and tell him to ease off it for a week or two until it heals. Ice it when it feels swollen. Standard twisted ankle procedure. 

He’s going to miss at least one game. 

Strangely enough, Derek doesn’t seem to mind.

Propped up on his dorm bed with pain meds taken and ankle iced, Derek smiles at him. 

Will still feels terrible. 

They drop Chowder back at the Haus, and then Will helps Derek up to his dorm. 

Will looks down at him in the bed with a frown.

Derek’s smile drops. 

“It’s not your fault, Will.”

Will blinks furiously, tears rising to his eyes unbidden, and shakes his head. 

“It’s just a twisted ankle,” Derek tries. 

“I could have stopped it,” Will whispers. “I  _ should _ have stopped it.”

“And show your magic to half the Haus?”

“Doesn’t matter. It just matters that you’re safe.”

“Will,” Derek says softly. He pats the side of the mattress and Will sinks down onto it. “What’s going on?”

He should tell him. He needs to tell him. He’s going to tell him.

“You asked me, once,” Will starts, then pauses to take a deep breath. “You asked me once who else my magic had protected.”

Derek nods, his eyebrows raising in confusion. 

“It’s just you. Only you.” 

“What?” 

Will looks down at his lap.

“The magic. It protects you. It protects… people I love.”

“What?” Derek says again. “You… you love me?”

Will nods and the tears that had been threatening at his eyes finally spill over. 

“Will, it’s alright, why are you crying?” Derek reaches up and brushes away the tears with his thumb, his eyebrows scrunching up on his forehead. “Please don’t cry.”

Will shakes his head a tiny bit, not wanting to knock Derek’s hand loose.

“I didn’t want you to know,” he says at last.

“Why?”

Will takes another deep breath, studying his fingers gripping Derek’s blanket, and then the words spill from him rapidly. “I didn’t want you to have to turn me down. It’s gonna ruin our friendship. And our d-partnership. And everything. And I just want you to be safe and I can’t keep you safe if you hate me.”

“Will, stop, please,” Derek finally interrupts. “Why would I turn you down?”

“I’m me. You’re you. It’s kinda obvious.” Dex huffs a self-deprecating laugh, still not looking up.

“Will, please look at me.” 

Will forces his eyes up to Derek’s and finds them full of tears of their own. 

“Are you hurt?” Will gasps. 

“No, I’m fine,” Derek says, not moving his hand from Will’s cheekbone. 

Will nods, though he’s not sure what he’s agreeing to.

“I love you, too,” Derek says softly. “I love you so much.”

Will’s mouth drops open and then he grins.

“I love you,” he answers. “So incredibly much.”

Derek grins back up at him. Will wants to kiss him. 

“I can’t really get up right now so I’m gonna need you to come down here,” Derek teases, “because you are entirely too far away.” 

Will wipes away the last of his tears and leans over Derek. He presses his forehead to his and closes his eyes. 

“Can I kiss you, Derek?”

“Yeah,” he breathes. 

Will shifts his head and touches his lips to Derek’s. His lips are soft and yield under Will’s and he sighs into the kiss. 

His magic thrums happily in his chest. 

When they break apart, both of them are panting. 

“I love you,” Will says again, because he can.

“I love you,” Derek replies with a wide smile. 

Will grins at him. 

“So your magic chose me, huh?”

“Well, I guess. My mom said it responds to who I love, so it’s a bit of a chicken or egg thing I think. But my magic definitely  _ knew  _ before I did. Because you’re a clumsy fool,” Will chirps.

Derek scoffs.

“My clumsy fool, though,” Will smiles and cuddles up to him in the bed, awkwardly trying not to jostle his ankle. 

“Good,” Derek answers. “My magic boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?” Will asks, sitting up a bit to look at Derek. 

His cheeks are tinted red when he meets Will’s eye. 

“If you want,” Derek amends. 

“I’d like nothing more,” Will agrees, and settles back into Derek’s side. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments make my life, seriously, i squeal when i get comments about things. i'm on tumblr at willdexpoindexter. tell me what you think? ily all, thank you for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> Update: Kath made [art of this!!! Go check it out, she’s amazing](https://korechthonia.tumblr.com/post/186902843694/the-traveling-man-by-kirani-willdexpoindexter)


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